Monday, May 07, 2012

The Mandel Smear Machine Starts Up

I'm not surprised that Republican Josh Mandel and his surrogates have already started their smear campaign against the champion of the middle class, Sen. Sherrod Brown, Democrat of Ohio. Josh Mandel has filled his Treasurer's office with his buddies, friends from college and high school, and his campaign workers. Now, with his continuing refusal to discuss any issue or respond to any question from the media and citizens, Josh Mandel feels the need to smear and dig up false allegations.

This is how the Josh Mandel campaign and the do-nothing Republican respond when Mandel refused to answer questions about his lack of support for the VAWA (Violence Against Women Act) renewal.

The National Republican Senatorial Committee (NRSC) sent out a link
on Monday to a story, written by a conservative website, reviving
26-year-old domestic violence allegations made against Sen. Sherrod
Brown by his wife during a messy divorce.

Brown’s
ex-wife, Larke Recchie, has since characterized the allegations she
made during the 1986 proceeding as “angry words” made during an
“unfriendly ordeal.”

In
a statement issued on Monday, in the wake of the NRSC’s missive, she
criticized Josh Mandel, Brown’s opponent for the U.S. Senate, for “dirty
campaigning.”

“I understand that in campaigns you often have to go after your
opponent, but Josh Mandel should know better than to go after our
family,” said Recchie, who has since remarried. “I ask that he
immediately put a stop to this kind of politics. I was proud to support
Sherrod in 2006 and I’m proud to support him again this time around
against Josh Mandel. Josh Mandel should immediately disavow this kind of
dirty campaigning.”

Why are we not surprised by the level of dirt that Josh Mandel will throw since he has no agenda, except that provided by the likes of far right Republicans? In 2010, Josh Mandel went after Kevin Boyce because one of Boyce's new hires was a Muslim. During the campaign for Ohio Treasurer, Mandel tried to say that Kevin Boyce was a Muslim, even though he is a Christian.

What does Josh Mandel want?
* Josh Mandel wants you to forget that cronyism exists in the office of the Ohio Treasurer.
* Mandel wants you to look at his boots instead of ask him question about issues.
* Josh Mandel delayed filing his PFD (personal financial disclosure) with the Senate. Mandel refused to send in his form for months even though everyone in the state knew he was a candidate.
* Josh Mandel refused to speak to a local press club for months. He was too busy, but apparently not too busy to attend every Lincoln dinner in the state, and fly to other states to collect campaign cash.
* Josh Mandel flew to the Bahamas to attend, speak, and collect campaign funds from attendees at a payday lenders convention.
* Josh Mandel wants women in Ohio to forget that he supported the heartbeat bill in Ohio.
* Josh Mandel wants you to overlook that he has hired unqualified people to care for your tax dollars.
* Josh Mandel took more than one year to disclose that he doesn't even has resumes for his 34 new hires in the office of Ohio Treasurer. Did he hire these people without resumes and without a work history?????
* Josh Mandel said he didn't support the auto loan program that helped save the American auto industry. Mandel said he had his own plan. He is a little too late now that the American auto industry is making cars, making profits, and creating jobs. When do you think Mandel will reveal his super secret auto rescue plan?

Josh Mandel has received the support of far right organizations that want to limit your access to birth control, pelvic exams, and reproductive freedom. He just won't tell you that because he would rather smear his opponent.